Chapter 23 #3
They took off from the tree where he parked and flew out into the city.
Away from the palace and the market and the academy – the only places she knew with any sort of familiarity.
Flying over the city proper, seeing the tree paths filled with brightly colored domini, all celebrating the holiday, made her think she had been doing herself a disservice by not seeing more.
After all, this was an alien planet. There were probably thousands, millions, of people on Earth who would kill for the chance to be where she was, and she was using the opportunity to hide and do yoga.
Admittedly, she wasn’t one of those of people.
She preferred stability and structure over change and adventure, but the fact remained that she was letting her alien life pass her by.
Calvitorum was a massive city, though it was easy to overlook considering only the large palace cleared the trees.
Everything else was built either on, in, or under the canopy.
And since building above the canopy was more expensive, the majority of the city was hidden beneath the leaves that she looked out over each morning from her balcony.
Flying under those leaves, following traffic lanes that she only barely understood, she could truly appreciate just how vibrant and how beautiful everything was. It was a wonderful combination of Tarzan tree homes and alien technology.
“That’s the stadium over there,” Romival said, surprising her. “You were there for vi Dominani’s Hortii Kristivar.”
“Hey, yeah,” she smiled, head cocking curiously because it didn't look like the multi-tiered wooden platform arena it had before. Instead, the space was filled with a strange spherical structure suspended between two crossing, curved beams that were both aglow with technology she had no hope of understanding. “What’s that there?”
“That’s the trikball setting for the stadium,” he said. “There’s a big game tonight.”
“Explains why so many people are there,” she said, laughing because it was the most sports-like thing she could imagine. The crowd was split into two separate colors - one deep violet and the other sparking blue - and they were already cheering though the spherical playing field was empty.
She knew very little about the sport, other than it was the most popular one in the universe. But she wasn’t into most sports, so she wasn’t surprised that hadn’t changed just because it was now being held on a 3D playing field.
“Over there is the medical center,” he said, pointing to something else they were flying past.
“Scarlet spends all her time studying there,” Holly said, grinning at the structure.
It had been built both around and inside of a massive tree, creating something like a cyborg tree skyscraper that was one of a kind in the forest city.
It looked like what she imagined technologically advanced elves would create for a hospital.
“She took her test to officially become a healer the other day,” Romival said, surprising her.
“She did?”
He grunted in confirmation. “I set the exam myself. Since she is working directly under First Healer, and she chose a higher-level difficulty, and she is an alien sitting for a domini exam, I felt it prudent to administer it personally.”
“Did she pass?”
“I am not at liberty to discuss exam results with anyone aside from the tested, their professor, or their mate,” he recited calmly, before grinning. “But she said she was going to tell you all tonight during the festival so you could celebrate.”
“She passed?!” Holly guessed, squealing excitedly, jumping up and down for her friend. “Oh, that’s so great!”
“You’re not upset?”
“Huh? Why would I be upset?”
“You’re with me and not them. You’re going to miss the announcement.”
Holly grinned, leaning against his arm as he piloted the hover through the ‘V’ of a tree that decided to grow in two directions about halfway up and was being stabilized by metal cables connecting the two halves of the trunk.
“They’ll tell me tomorrow and that gives us an excuse to celebrate again. Besides,” she continued, blushing, “I’m exactly where I want to be.”
He smirked at her, pleased, before changing the subject.
Pointing out more things that they were passing as he flew them towards his home tree.
A park hung suspended between three trees that domini - adults and children - played on like a giant jungle gym.
A communications building dedicated to news and entertainment programming.
A massive statue of a female warrior carved and bronzed from a tree that had died but not fallen.
It was normally surrounded by hiking paths that were, at the moment, completely underwater thanks to the rainy season.
There was so much to see and so much to learn about her new home.
Entertainment venues and shopping centers - which were like the market, but confined to a single tree – restaurants, an art gallery, a massive, sprawling building inside the canopy of two trees that was basically a poetry cafe.
Alanna would really love that place, if she didn't know of it already.
There was so much beyond the palace, and Holly hadn’t seen any of it.
She was so entranced by everything – illuminated by glowing flowers and artificial, multi-colored lights like Christmas on steroids – that she almost missed their approach to one of the many residential trees.
They had passed a lot of them, each one covered in dozens of homes – smaller near the bottom and getting progressively larger towards the top.
Since Romival wasn’t approaching them, she didn't really give them more than a passing glance.
The one that Romival finally aimed his car towards was just another tree out of the hundreds that made up the city.
He flew his hover towards the start of the thick canopy and latched it down against the tree, right beside a platform that formed the base of a large home that extended upward into the canopy itself, all but the lowest level swallowed up by leaves.
Romival opened the top of the hover and extended a ramp out the side so he could step off, holding out a hand for her to follow.
She did so, staring up the entire time, admiring the black metal and glass structure perched among the branches like a glittering bug.
The down facing garage they had flown up into was fully protected from the rain, but she got to watch it falling down through the clear glass walls as he led her to a set of spiral stairs that took them up to the bottom floor of his home.
“This is all yours?” Holly asked, looking around eagerly.
“It’s newly refurbished,” he said. “I took out a lot of the walls when I moved in. Added stained glass in the bedroom. Expanded the kitchen.”
“It’s beautiful,” Holly breathed, walking across the lowest room.
The entire outer wall was covered in glass that, she knew from looking in, was tinted, but didn't appear so from this side.
The inner wall, however, was covered in beautiful, glass tile mosaics that flowed smoothly from one color to another in long, reaching swirls.
The stone floor was heated, she could feel it warming her feet through her sandals.
Another spiral staircase led up further while a wide archway formed the entrance to the dining room.
It was dim inside, as he hadn’t turned on the lights.
The only illumination came from the rainbow of colors filtering in through the windows from the various parties taking place outside.
The glass appeared warped thanks to the falling rain that had barely picked up since they left the palace, but the view was still unmistakable and amazing as she gazed out over the city.
But as beautiful as it was, she was still distracted by Romival’s reflection as he stepped up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist.
“You like my home?” He asked, leaning over to whisper the question in her ear.
“Well, I like this room of it,” she chuckled.
“Let me show you the rest then.”
That was so obviously a line that would end up with them in his bedroom, but she also didn’t care as he took her hand and led her away from the window.
Showing great restraint based on the hard bulge at the front of his pants, he did in fact give her a tour instead of taking her right to his bed.
He showed her his dining room, which had a table with four chairs, though two of them had been pushed against the inner wall while the other two were angled so that they could both look out of the window.
Beyond that was the kitchen which appeared to only have cabinets and cupboards – no stove, no refrigerator, no appliances out on the counters.
She knew better than to think that they weren’t there, or that she would even recognize the alien versions as she had yet to set foot in an alien kitchen.
Hattie would probably know her way around here, but Holly just admired the black and white motif he had going on.
Aside from the mosaic along the inner wall, there were no colors in the home. Which just made the mosaic appear that much brighter, so she thought that must be the point.
Up the spiral staircase, the second level of the house had his home study, work room, as well as his entertainment room.
He showed her all of them. She was tempted to ask about his projects that she saw spread out along his work bench, but she let it rest for now.
If she got him started, there was a chance they wouldn’t get to his room anytime soon.
And she was very interested in seeing his bedroom.
Up the stairs again to the third and highest level. The ceiling just barely broke the canopy, and it was made of glass panes in a rainbow of colors that made her gasp with awe. And they weren’t even lit up yet. She could only see the glowing moons through them.